Paris, June 28, 2025 – Hot on the heels of Longchamp, Lacoste is the latest French luxury label to announce the opening of its own cafe. Although these stylish new hangouts haven’t signed up any famous French chefs, their opening highlights the growing crossover between the worlds of high fashion and gastronomy, all while bringing the brands closer to their followers.
The date is set for July 10 in Monaco. Tennis fans, and in particular spectators of the Rolex Monte-Carlo Masters, have already had a sneak preview of the new Cafe Lacoste – a location bearing the logo of the famous brand with the crocodile logo, now helmed by British designer Pelagia Kolotouros.
The cafe promises visitors a chic coffee break at the Le Meridien Beach Plaza hotel. On the menu are a revisited club sandwich with tarragon mayonnaise, a Caesar salad topped with grated beef karasumi and a miso sauce, as well as a bowl of grains and green vegetables seasoned with a Menton lemon vinaigrette.
The dishes are created by restaurateur Riccardo Giraudi and are served in a lawn-green setting, echoing Lacoste’s signature shade. The green crocodile has also inspired a pistachio dessert, while the clay courts on which many of the brand’s sponsored tennis players shine – such as at Roland Garros and Monte Carlo – have inspired a delightfully retro tiramisu.
And since this is indeed a cafe, the new venue will serve a range of lattes, including pistachio and vanilla versions.
Cafe Lacoste will be open all summer until 2am until September, then from 9am to midnight between October and April.
And this isn’t the only place to share a cappuccino or grab a quick bite to eat while looking stylish around France and its environs this summer.
Longchamp opened its very first cafe in Paris in early June. This new spot is perfect for meeting up with friends or taking a break, and aims to be a place to hang out at any time of day, from breakfast to after work.
Designed in the spirit of a bookshop cafe, Cafe Longchamp offers pastries, croque-monsieur sandwiches made with cooked ham and six-month-old Comte cheese, and a selection of salads made with carefully sourced ingredients, such as Ortiz tuna belly.
Everything is intentionally refined, in keeping with the design of the location, whose artistic direction was entrusted to Constantin Riant, a Parisian illustrator and ceramist. The famous cobalt blue, reminiscent of the colour that once adorned the shopfronts of the capital’s artisans, gives Cafe Longchamp its unique atmosphere and charm.
The almost simultaneous opening of these chic new venues is not entirely coincidental. It is very much indicative of the fashion industry’s appetite for venturing into the food world, in the form of cafes and restaurants. And this is not a recent phenomenon.
Trailblazer Ralph Lauren opened his first cafes in 2014. And his flagship store in Saint-Germain-des-Pres in Paris was launched in 2017.
The union of gastronomy and fashion has also become self-evident with the collaboration between one of the most talented French pastry chefs of his generation, Maxime Frederic, and Louis Vuitton.
The chef at Cheval Blanc Paris brings gourmet flair to the iconic French label at Café Maxime Frederic at Louis Vuitton, which opened just over two years ago. Meanwhile, in London’s Heathrow Airport, Louis Vuitton chose another well-known French chef, Cyril Lignac, to spearhead its cafe.
There are plenty of other examples, like the partnership between Anne-Sophie Pic and Dior, not in Paris, but in Japan (Tokyo and Osaka), and China (Chengdu). In the French capital, the Dior restaurant was in the spotlight when it opened in 2022 thanks to the aura of the chef responsible for giving the eatery its culinary identity: Jean Imbert. – AFP
